My Best Church Life - Week 2 - The CORE - Pastor Michael Ewart
My Best Church Life
Week 2 - The CORE
Pastor Michael Ewart
Well, good morning everybody. And again, welcome to our sermon series”My best church life”. I'm so excited about this series. It's so practical in how we can grow in our faith. You do want to grow in your faith, right? I assume so, because you're here.
We just started a brand new Starting Point group, and a whole lot of the people in there have been telling me that the reason that they started coming back to church, or are coming to church for the first time and the reason that they're in Starting Point is because they do want to grow in their faith. And I mean who wouldn't want to right? To grow in our confidence, before God to grow in our knowledge of his grace and in his truth to know and rejoice and be sure that the death of Jesus on the cross, is the full complete payment for all of my sin. That because of Jesus, God is good with me, and I'm good with him. And I've got an eternal future with him who wouldn't want to be growing in their faith and, and in this series where we're talking about exactly that we're looking at a proven process that helps people to grow in faith. It's not a proven process that we came up with. We can't take the credit for it. We are sharing with you what God himself has told us in his word about the way that we can be growing in our faith regularly. So that's what we're trying to do here.
But the key is if we want to grow in a certain area, isn't the truth that we don't just have to know what will help us to grow. We actually have to do it, we have to put it into practice, right? And that's true of any area of life, isn't it? If you want to have financial independence and find financial security, it's not just enough to study a bunch of books and then nod your head and then keep doing what you've been doing because that's not going to change anything, is it? You actually have to put it into practice. You have to start creating a budget, you have to start living. According to that budget, tracking your expenses, making some financial goals, sacrificing now for a bigger goal later, and then things change, right?
Or maybe a more precise example, would be a garden. You want to have the potatoes and the tomatoes and the cucumbers and you want the produce from that garden? You want it because it's so delicious. It would be so awesome to have it. But maybe you have to do something. You have to actually cultivate some dirt and you have to plant some seeds and you have to water it. Then you have to weed it. And then you will enjoy the produce. We have to actually do something in order to make it grow and let me be clear. First of all, the growth of faith that happens in our hearts is not something that we can produce that is something that God the Holy Spirit does in us, he works in us, he creates faith in us like, like we just saw him create faith in little Onyx this morning. He does that. He strengthens our faith, but God says that the Holy Spirit uses some means through which he works. And through which he strengthens our connection to Jesus. And all, what produces what fruit grows when our connection to Jesus is stronger?
We read in the scripture that when we are connected to Jesus and our faith and him is solid rooted, growing, we enjoy in greater and greater measure in our daily living things like joy, obviously, and peace. No matter what you're going through, no matter what, your challenging circumstances, can you imagine having more peace in your life? To be a more gentle person to be oozing the kindness with everybody in your life and in your family to have a greater measure of self-control. This is what God promises when we have the fruit of the spirit. When we are rooted in Jesus more self-control, a pastor climate, I already have perfect self-control.
Whenever your area of my life said, nobody ever, this different for all of us where we struggle with our self-control, right? For some, it's the donuts, for some, it's the alcohol for the different things, but we all want that self-control. We want those fruits growing in our like, we want to see the produce, so that means we got to do something. We got to plant those Jesus roots, grow in our faith, in God, and do what God says that helps that to happen. And that's what this series is all about. So my challenge to you is that it's throughout this series and I know we already had one message. She might have to go back and listen to it. If you haven't heard it or reviewed it or looked at your notes from last time, but my challenge is for each one of the messages, there's gonna be six in total that you will find one thing in particular unique to you for your circumstance, your situation. One next step, one enhancement, one new thing that you weren't doing, one thing that you were doing, but you want to blow it up and make it bigger for each one of these messages? What will your one thing be? What are you going to put into practice that is going to help your faith to grow your connection, to Jesus to get stronger and therefore more fruit of the spirit to grow in your life.
Last week Pastor Mike shared with us, that we are in a church right now that is enjoying some some amazing growth. So many churches post COVID are steady or declining and yet in the last three years God has blessed us with three times more people attending on a given Sunday than what we're enjoying back then. I just recently heard that our official membership for the CORE just surpassed a thousand for the first time. God is blessing us with growth, and Pastor Mike shared with us last week. How when we gather together as a big group, with a growing church with people using their, their gifts, their musical gifts, their resources for the common good. This time together is pretty awesome. And we are really blessed when we do this.
But let me be honest with you.
This is good as it is and as needed as it is, this is not enough.
And God would say so too. And that's what I want to talk to you about today because the truth of the matter is that as our church grows larger, and if we wanted to grow larger and to keep growing larger at the very same time, our church has to grow smaller.
Say what? That's a contradiction. You're not making any sense, Pastor Michael, for our church to grow larger it has to grow smaller. And by that, I mean this: that as a church gets bigger and bigger and bigger, it can be easier to lose yourself in the large crowd. Not to get to know anybody personally. And the small part of the church is then missing. And spiritual growth will be lacking today. I want to convince you that our church also has to grow smaller. Our small groups are small connections with groups of people that the little groups that we have the people that we know, those relations does those connections, they have to be growing as well. If we are going to be a healthy, strong and growing church, Can prove that from the Bible. So we're going to, I'm going to show you a place in the Old Testament and a place in the New Testament that there are a bunch more places we could have looked at but I'm going to limit it to that today to show you that that we also need to be growing smaller as we continue to grow larger. The first example, I want to share with you comes from Exodus chapter 18 where there is a guy there whose name was Moses, maybe you've heard of him and he was a new leader for a large nation of people. Estimate, maybe a couple million people and Moses was a gifted leader. He was called by God, God had directly revealed the law to him. His instructions for daily living, Godly living, Moses knew all of these things, he was an extraordinarily capable man. And he was drowning. He was trying to serve the individual needs of the entire nation and you can imagine how well that works and kind of just tell you that this doesn't work very well in a larger church, either. That in our church now between two campuses we have 3,150 or so members. And we have five pastors serving that many people to which some people say why you guys are hogging all the pastors. There are other churches that need a pastor. We have one pastor for every 625 members and I can tell you right now, it is not possible even with five pastors for us to individually serve. All those people in a small mission congregation where you've got a pastor serving 40 or 50 people, it's somewhat possible. Although I would suggest that even in that circumstance, a person serving 50 is also not feasible. People will not be served in the best way, even in that circumstance, but we are well beyond that. So what do we do in this circumstance? How can the individual needs of people still be met when we are a large church? Well, we're going to learn from Moses. What did he do? He had a father in law, his name was Jethro and and Jethro, I don't know if he had his MBA or not, but he seemed to know something about business and management, and he recognized that what Moses was doing was bad, it wasn't going to work and and people weren't being served. Moses wasn't doing a great job and he says this in Exodus 18:14. Jethro says to Moses, why do you alone sit as judge while all these people stand around you from morning till evening. So can you imagine people queuing up in line at 6 am at the crack of dawn and they want to talk to Moses because they've got a dispute that needs to be settled. They want some directions from God's leader and they want the wisdom of God applied to their first particular situation and circumstance. It's so important to them. They get there at the crack of dawn. They wait in line, there's already a long line, they literally wait all day to talk to Moses. The sun is setting, they're still 131st in line and they don't get to see him that day. That's the situation Moses, putting in long hours, 80 plus hours a week of work, from morning till night. He's trying to serve the people. He wants to serve
You want to spend time with his people, but they're not being served, he's not doing a great job, he's getting burned out, Moses’ father-in-law said to him, “What you are doing is not good, Moses. I'm here you and these people who come to you will only wear yourselves out, you're getting worn out. People's needs aren't getting met. The work is too heavy for you. You cannot handle it alone. Moses, you need a new system.
And so Jethro, success, something he says this but select capable men from among all the people men who fear God. Trustworthy men. Honest men and to appoint them as officials over thousands, hundreds, 50s and tens.
What kind of men was he looking for? First of all, don't cross over that part. Well, you they were looking for natural born leaders, extroverted personalities, confident in their skills with proven business ability. No way that didn't say any of that, that's not what they were looking for. They're looking for capable men. So yeah. People who had some natural gifts and who were hardworking, but what were the criteria? Men who fear God, men who know and worship the one true God, who understand that God is in control, that God's word rules? That his truth and grace are what matter. Men that fear God, that was the, the main criteria trust were the men who hate this for his gain. Not somebody that's gonna take a bribe, but somebody that Moses could trust to do the work of God faithfully, that is the type of people that they were looking for.
So, put them in charge of these thousands, hundreds, fifties, and tens. And he says, if you do this and God so commands you will be able to stand the strain and all these people will go home satisfied. This is a great plan, Moses put this into effect and you're going to not be working 100 hour weeks anymore. You're this drain will be lifted off of your, you're right to sleep, so much better at night and the people Serve are going to be happier too, they will be served better as well. Now, as when I read this, this scripture passage, I remember back was either college or some interview when I was reading it. It surprised me how small Jethro went. Okay, so obviously, there's a problem. One guy is not going to serve two million directly. There needs to be some more leaders and officials and managers in their and so leading thousands. That makes perfect sense to me. A leader of hundreds? Yeah, I think I can still go there. A leader of 50. Come on. Jethro, you're getting a little bit micromanaging here. It doesn't need to be that small. Leader of 10? Now, come on. That's that's pretty small. But I'm not sure why you would need to go that small in order to serve the people. But Jethro was smart. Jethro knew what he was talking about. Jethro believed and knew and Moses believed it too. That every individual was important, that every individual mattered, that everyone needed a voice, that everyone had needs that had to be met, that everyone had problems that needed to be addressed. And the only way for every last person to be served and to minister and to serve one another was to get that small down to a group of ten. Capital this market going on and this is what I would insist is important and vital for us today. If you are going to live your best church life, I'm gonna go with Jethro. Your best church life requires, absolutely requires life in the tens.
Your best church life requires life in the tens. We have to get that small in order to serve one another. Well otherwise your needs will not be met. Now this is the reason why here at the CORE, at 922 ministries, at our St. Peter campus too. This is why we value Life Groups so much. This is why we created this environment. This system that gets down to the tens in groups of up to 10, maybe 12 people, you do life together with them. There's a facilitator, a leader and an official who facilitates, moderates helps you to connect with one another to minister to one another, to be able to listen to one another. Encourage one another, pray for one another. This is why we do this. It's biblical. Jethro had Moses do this and it worked Marvelously.
But we see it in the New Testament too. It wasn't just Moses that implemented, a system like this. Did you know Jesus did too?
Soon as Jesus began his public ministry, about the age of 30. These baptized what is the first thing he does? He does. Well, he the son of God who has a worldwide movement to start? That would eventually bring billions to faith or of course he goes and finds the best thousand people in Israel to be his followers. No, I didn't.
About a hundred then, right?
12. He found 12, I can't even say good men, he found 12 men. They had issues and he decided I'm doing life together with them, three and a half years. Jesus spent most of his time with just those 12 men. Because he knew that for his church to grow large, he would intentionally, first of all, have to grow it small. And that's exactly what he did. The church that came after was patterned in exactly the same way and it's my hope and prayer that we're going to follow this in our church today as well. So let me read to you some section from Acts chapter 2 in the early church. We hear about two types of meetings that they had back then and we're also going to hear about the blessing's that we have when we do life in the tens. When we do life in a small group of people that we know really well and we're vulnerable and transparent when we do life together in that way, what are some of the blessings that we experience? And actually, after we read this, they, the early Christians devoted themselves to the apostles teaching. By that about, we understand them to mean basically the new testament, so it wasn't written quite yet. But the apostles were still there and Jesus sent them out in his name and he promised them a special measure of the Holy Spirit. So they would remember everything that he talked and said. So the apostles would teach, and then the people would remember this teaching, and share this teaching with each other and then, eventually the New Testament, got written down in just a few years after that. And, and that's what the people with study, just like, just like we do today. They devoted themselves to the word of God, is what that means and to fellowship and to the breaking of bread. And to prayer.
What else did they do? They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need Every day, they continued to meet together in the temple courts. And I think this is a reference to large group meetings. A typical courts were a wide open outdoor space, where thousands of people could gather and the early church didn't turn into a mega church in very short order on the day of Pentecost when Peter preached a sermon. There were three thousand people that were baptized in that one day and as you keep reading through the book of Acts you see more more people were added and there were thousands of people and some people estimate that within about 25 years, the church in Jerusalem would have had well over a hundred thousand members. Where did they meet? They would go to the temple courts. This wide open area where they could gather together in a large group setting, I would imagine there was some worship and praise going on. And it says they broke bread. Where? In their homes. First century homes were not 2,600 square feet.
That normal everyday people lived in pretty small homes. Could they fit 10 in a home? It would be tight but they could. Could they fit 50 in a home? Definitely not, unless there were rich people, some rich people had big homes but there weren't many of those. These were small groups meeting and people's homes having meals together, eating together, getting together regularly, they ate together and look, it says with glad and sincere hearts praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people and the Lord added to their number daily, those who were being saved.
So much good stuff just in these few verses we see a picture of the early Christian church. A model that they followed that I think is equally valuable for us to follow today. Large group gatherings, we're doing it right now. We have the luxury of having a building where we can get together like this in a large group setting and worship and praise God together. And this is awesome and this is essential, and this is good. And there's something more. We need those gatherings in our homes as well. The small groups, we need life in the tens to also truly thrive as a church.
This time in rows, we're seeing in rows and we're all facing this way. It's good, it's needed, it's essential, but time in circles, is every bit is important. For the growth of our church sitting together in small circles of 10 or so people. That's what we need. If we're going to continue to grow our faith, in our church is going to continue to grow this type of gathering, I think it is awesome at being inspirational. I go from this worship service every week, so uplifted, so encouraged and I pray that you do too. But in my experience, what I have found is that if you want not just inspirational, but transformational, that requires life in the tens, that's where you get accountability. That's where you get God's grace and truth applied personally to you and your life. So for you to live your best church life, I hope I've convinced you that you also need life in the tens because there are some tremendous blessings that God gives through our small groups. Let me share three of them with you. We need life in the tens life and small groups, number one for firm faith.
For our faith to remain strong and to grow. God wants us in small groups of Christians who are doing life together. One reason for this is that it helps the frequency of hearing God's grace and truth, We hear once a week here on a Sunday, but if we're also meeting with our friends individually and separately, if we're also meeting in small groups during the week, we're going to hear God's word again.
And it's so important for growing in the faith here we hear God's word of truth and grace expressed generally to all but not individually to each. You probably have noticed and you're probably very thankful that when pastor Mike or me preach, or address you as a congregation. We don't say, oh, yeah, and by the way, Frank, remember what I'm saying here, this applies to you in this way for this reason. And, and remember that send you told me the other day, Jane. Yeah, you're gonna want to listen next because what I'm gonna say applies to what you are confessing to me that would be really awkward, wouldn't it? We can't bring it. We can't make it individual at a large group setting like this but we do need it addressed personally to our circumstance to our situation. So let me give you an example, you gather here in church on Sunday and almost not almost every Sunday without fail every Sunday. We talk about the Lord, Jesus, we talk about his perfect life, his death on the cross, for the forgiveness of sins. You are forgiven and redeemed by the shed blood of Jesus and God loves you and heaven is your guaranteed eternal future. God is with you and you're encouraged by that and you. Amen to that. Although there's probably a few people out there at that point we’re thinking you have a pastor, you don't know me.
You don't know what I did.
You don't know my struggle. You don't know what I did last night. You don't know what I fell into for the 39th time even though I promised after the first time I would never do it again. Pastor. If you knew what I did, I would blush 23 shades of red. And I would be so ashamed. I would probably never talk to you again. I don't think you're talking to me.
We can't make it that personal, right? But if you are in a small group, a group of trusted Christian friends. Can you say it to them? I swore off the alcohol, I had too much to drink again last night. They can see a brother. You're sin is forgiven, Jesus took that very thing. When he died on the cross, he knew you were gonna do that. He said, father don't punish him, punish me, he died for you. Rather, you're forgiven and you're filled with the spirit, we're gonna walk with you. We're gonna help you through this. But I want you to know, you are right with God. You are forgiven by God, he is not red faced and angry at you right now. He is smiling and he embraces you and we do too. Maybe there's a group hug at that point in your small group. We just can't do that here, right? Best to grow in our faith for our church to grow. We have to grow small first. And then we will remain firm in the faith.
There's a second thing. Life in the tens also means that you're going to have fantastic friendships.
Fantastic friendships. In the early church, they had this fellowship with one another. They spent time together daily and their connection, their friendships were so strong. So good. So loving, they spent time together so that they would love one another. They would encourage one another, they would support one another, they would build one another out there with confess their sins to each other. They would tell each other that your sins are forgiven.
They bore one another's burdens. They supported one another. It was awesome. And it can be awesome for you too. Fantastic friendships. You see your pastors? We love you and we are here to serve you but it's simply impossible because of the numbers for us to meet your needs personally. All of you We just can't but in a small group they can meet your spiritual needs. They can apply God's word of truth to your particular circumstance. They can encourage you and support you. You can admit your particular sin to them and they can tell you God's specific forgiveness for that sin. They can support you spiritually. Your spiritual needs can be met. In addition, your physical needs can be met. Did you catch that from our reading in the book of Acts that people would actually sell stuff property in order to help those that were in a genuine need? They knew their real need and they were happy to give in sacrifice for their friends. Because they knew that they needed this. And so, their physical needs were provided for on an individual basis. It was their emotional needs were met. It said that they worshiped together with glad and sincere hearts. Praising God. They weren't discouraged. They weren't depressed. They weren't anxious. They were glad and encouraging one another, their emotional needs were met, we're at. And their relational needs were met that it sounds like, in the description that we read that. There were a lot of lonely Christians in that first century.
We have a lot today. And I think it's because we're not strong enough in our and growing small in our small groups, that's where you'll get the relational support that you need. So isn't this a beautiful picture of the fantastic friendships that God wants us to have through small groups? We're going to do it doing these a little bit out of order today. I've one more important point I do want to share with you.
We need people. Many people for a firm faith. We need people for fantastic friendships. We need church people. People who know Jesus for all these things, but there's also one more important thing. We need people to save more souls. Now it sounds a little bit counterintuitive. No, no. We need a better, big gathering like this. If we want to save more souls. This is what brings people in. No, we want to save more souls. We're gonna bring more people to Jesus. We need, we need life in the tens. Also. I'm convinced that that's how the early Christian Church, grew. That as the people loved one another in their homes, the neighbors took notice. These Christians are weird. Look how they love each other so selflessly. They sell property to help those among them that are in need. That's really weird. And I want to get me some of that. And they would ask, and they would find about Jesus and his unconditional love, and the church group, my hope and my prayer is that our church will grow in the very same way. That as we show max Jesus in our life and in our relationships with each other, is we show so much loved the world? It's gonna be attractive to me like a magnet drawing people in. They we’re gonna know. Where did you get this? And how do I get me some?
So this stuff really works.
Where is this? Just a pipe dream. It's all nice and theory, Pastor Michael. But give me a real life example. Glad you asked, got a fresh one from this past Monday, so I was just scrolling Facebook in the evening and I came across a post from one of our members. She gave me permission to share this. Her name is Pop and here's what happened. It was 8:32 pm on Monday evening and Pop wasn't feeling so great. She said a group message to just a few friends from church, here she said, “Hi friends. I'm sorry to bother you at this time of night, I need some prayers to lift my spirit, I've been feeling heavy for the last few days, if you could help, it would be very much appreciated. And here's what happened next. There's an immediate response. Oh, absolutely Pop for sure. Pop, the whole Martin clan will send up a storm tonight. You know how many of those there are? There are a lot of prayers going up, definitely sending prayers away pop. Tasers will be praying for you. I love that you reached out Pop. I'm praying for you now, prayers for you this morning to next morning. Some there's more texting will be praying for you as well. Seven different people responded, in short order and I think I counted eight heart emojis. Pop knew immediately. She was loved. She was encouraged. She was being prayed for. So, I had to reach out to Pop. And I said, so what, why did you reach out to them? Why these people of all the people that, you know, she said in our first life group, Pastor Mike and courage to share and pray for each other. We were really hesitant to join a group at first, but now, I'm so glad we did everybody. I reached out to is from the CORE.
And what was, what was Pop’s response to this outpouring of support and encouragement in prayers for her? What I want to read next, is what she posted on Facebook, what I saw on that Monday evening or was Tuesday. And here's what she posted publicly. This is something that the whole world could see and she said this, have you ever cried so hard by yourself because you realize how blessed you are? I had it happen to me today. I've been feeling discouraged from the past few days. I couldn't get my spirit back up. Even after prayers it's been hard until I reached out to my friends. Last night, I asked them to pray for me in these green shots or the messages that I got from them. I'm so touched. She goes on, in all things, God works for the good of those who love him. Today, I realized that I have way too many blessings to count, even when it gets hard, I know God's always listening. I deserve nothing. I was blind to see my blessings, but thanks to all the prayers. He answered them. I'm so thankful for such amazing friends like, you guys,
Do you see what else happened to Pop in her time of need? Reach out to her friends and get the encouragement that she needed for her personal needs at that moment. Yes, yes she did. That was awesome. That was beautiful. You see what else happened?
Was it about this to the whole world? And I have to think so many people saw that thought, Wow, that's weird. She could text somebody at night and seven people replied to pray for her and encourage her and in very short order and she was encouraged. Who does that? That's weird. I want me some of that.
Pop can have some opportunities. Do you think in the coming days or weeks to witness her faith and lead more people to Jesus?
I think she will.
Life in the tens. It's a blessing.
Perform faith for fantastic friendships and to reach more souls. You want to grow in faith? What's your next step? Write it down now. Let's do life in the tens.
